Uprising: Book 1: Afternoon
by silverlining9
Summary: Nightmare Moon is plotting her return, and she has help!
1. Prologue: Dark Meeting

Not a single creature noticed the imaginary zone created in the middle of the Everfree Forest. Maybe because it was meant to be undetectable, and for the most part, it was, except to those privileged enough to know about it. And to every pony that ended up close to it, they noticed absolutely nothing out of the ordinary. Not even Celestia or Luna themselves could detect the zone.

Inside the imaginary zone was a dark clearing. No stars were bright enough to penetrate the field of magic that surrounded the zone, and even the moon's light was blocked, making it nearly pitch black inside the field. The only light was that of a fire that burned in the very center of the clearing, surrounded by 8 hooded figures. The light from the fire danced gracefully around the clearing, casting a shadow for each 4-legged figure out towards the edge of the clearing. The figures stood there, quietly watching the fire while they waited.

In the sky above, a midnight purple and blue cloud swooped around, eventually landing in a gap between 2 of the figures. Each figure bowed towards the sentient smoke as it formed into a more solid shape. The smoke condensed into a tall, sleek pony. On both of its sides grew large wings. A mane and tail of black smoke formed on her head and flanks, both were long and elegant, flowing off the side even though no wind blew. A large, sharp horn shot out of the top of the large pony's head. When its eyes opened, they gave off a dark purple glow, as if it were overflowing with magic. The hooded ponies remained bowed as the dark Alicorn looked at its surroundings.

The Alicorn looked over each figure, stopping on one, a slightly humorous smile spread across the Alicorn's muzzle. "I see you had to send a changeling in your stead, my dear Queen Chrysalis. How goes your recovery?" The Alicorn's voice, smooth and feminine, a slightly sinister tone to it, held genuine concern towards the Queen as she spoke and heard through the changeling.

The changeling reached up to push back its dark, oversized hood; its sleeves falling slightly to reveal a black, hole-filled limb. As its hood fell back, it stood and looked up at the Alicorn, a black face was revealed in the firelight. The reveal showed a creature whose green mane and small horn were riddled with holes. The eyes glow a low, ominous, green as it looked up to the Alicorn and spoke, its voice sounded like many voices speaking in unison. "Thank you for your concern, my dear friend. I assure you that I shall be fully recovered soon enough. I apologize that I could not present myself in person, but I am currently tending to my weakened forces. It shouldn't take us more than a month to regroup and regain our full strength again." Queen Chrysalis' words coming through the changeling gave a sense of disconnect to the other members of the group.

The dark Alicorn chuckled quietly. "That is good to hear. I hope you do not run into any complications." The changeling nodded as the smoky figure dismissed it and its queen turning its head slightly to address another figure. "And how goes out chemical and biological weapons, Xira?"

Another hooded shadow lifted a leg and removed its hood as it stood. The zebra watched the fire, not looking at the Alicorn out of sheer respect and fear. Her mane was a short Mohawk, mostly black with a few white streaks running along it in jagged lines. Her eyes were a deep red, and when she spoke, it was with a deep, melodic voice. "My goddess, it goes very good; my time limit was well understood." Her words rhymed with ease as she gave her status update.

With a nod, the Alicorn looked over the other 6 figures. With the fire illuminating them slightly, it was easy to make out that there were 2 unicorns, 2 pegasi, and 2 earth ponies. The Alicorn smiled slightly, seeing that her plans were slowly, but steadily, coming to fruition. With a raise of her smoky wings and head, she announced to the group, "We shall meet here again in a month's time! Until then, continue my work!" The Alicorn's figure reshaped back into its smoky cloud and then rose into the dark sky, disappearing from sight.

As the smoke flew off, the group chanted in unison:

"LONG LIVE NIGHTMARE MOON! LONG LIVE THE GODDESS OF DARKNESS!"


	2. Chapter 1: A Slow Day

A dark blur, followed by a silver and dark red streak, sped across the sky. The Pegasus flew over the land, his large wings created enormous amounts of force with each flap. His dark blue body stood out against the light blue sky and white clouds.

The winged pony began to descend towards a small field. After landing, he took a moment to fix his wind-blown mane and tail. He usually kept his mane rather short (not liking the hair sticking to his neck when he got hot) and in a charming spike-filled mess. His tail was the same way, except he lets that hair grow out more, liking how it leaves a longer streak behind him as he flew. His mane and tail were a silver-gray color with streaks of dark red through it.

He stretched out a little, allowing the sun to shine off of his silver cloud cutie mark. He was tired, having just flown from some ruins by Galloping Gorge, on the western side of Equestria, across most of the northern side of the kingdom, and to this small field by Fillydelphia, on the east coast of Equestria.

The stallion looked at his surroundings, making sure he had landed in the right clearing. In the middle of the field was a small, shimmering lake. A little to the east of the lake was a massive oak tree, bigger than most the trees in Equestria. Past the tree, further east, the Fillydelphia skyline could be seen. South of the clearing stood the edge of some un-named forest, a few mountains rising up from the center of the sea of trees. The north held the rugged Foal Mountains; a place the dark blue stallion had adventured into quite often when he got bored, due to its many hiding places for caves and a few legends of lost cities. Far to the east stood the powerful city of Canterlot, the capital of Equestria, where the princesses Celestia and Luna ruled over all of ponykind from their mountain-top castle.

With another quick look around, the large-winged Pegasus decided that he had time to take a quick nap before the others arrived. He trotted up to the side of the lake, laying down on the soft grass, and closed his eyes…

"WAKE UP, SILVER! OR YOU'RE NEVER GETTING LAID!"

Silver woke up with a start. He wasn't sure how long he had been asleep by the lake, but it was long enough for some pony to sneak up to him, lean down by his head, and yell in his ear. His first thoughts were "WHAT THE HELL!?" followed closely by "Wait…I recognize that voice…" It took him just a few moments of hearing the giggle that came from beside him to recognize the culprit.

Sitting beside Silverlining was a white unicorn mare. Her eyes were blue with a purple tint and were surrounded by a pair of simple black rimmed glasses. Her mane was a swirl of blue and gray curls. Her tail rose from her flanks and elegantly fell like a waterfall of blue and gray. Her flanks bore a cutie mark in the shape of a white heart with a pair of elaborately elegant blue wings wrapping around and embracing the heart.

The mare then spoke again, her voice now much quieter in comparison to when she last spoke. Her voice was gentle and sweet, her words sounding like music to Silver's ears. "Are you awake now, honey?"

Silver smiled at the white mare, knowing that he should have expected this to happen. "Yes, yes I am, Ocean." He rolled his eyes and laughed a little.

Ocean Selene giggled again, and then launched herself at Silver, barraging him with kisses. The mare kissed him repeatedly on the lips, wrapping her fore hooves around Silver's neck while Silver kissed back and wrapped his around her midsection. After a minute, the mare backed off, allowing Silver to stand up and greet the others, whom he knew would not have let Ocean travel from Fillydelphia to this field alone.

A large, brown earth pony stood a few yards away, laughing quietly at the events that just occurred in front of him. The stallion had green eyes, over which he wore a pair of simple, wire-rimmed glasses that had been painted a darker, mystic green. His mane and tail were a dark green with a black stripe in the middle. His mane formed into a famer style set of bangs and it swooped down to lightly lie on the back of his neck. His tail simply rose from his flanks and fell back down, giving volume to the rather short tail. A picture of a small sapling with two leaves shown on his flanks. Over-all, Earthroot was a strong stallion and a good friend.

To Earthroot's left stood another stallion. Pyroneus Dawnlight stood shorter than Earthroot, but he was much more intimidating. The dark blue stallion had a pair of bat-like wings, and a matching fin where his mane should be. To add to his Nightmare Night-like appearance, he had a long, skinny tail that ended in three spikes. To top off the costume that was the way he was born, he had piercing red eyes that would scare most ponies half to death with just a glance. His flanks were covered by an anvil and sword cutie mark.

Silver smiled at the two stallions, and then looked past them, to the base of the oak tree. Sitting under the tree, by himself, writing in his notebook (as he always did), was Cresant Quill. Quill was a small green earth pony with an even brighter green mane and tail. His mane barely touched the back of his neck as it fell from his head in a wavy fashion. His tail, on the other hoof, was long and curly. He wore glasses that were rounded at the muzzle and ended in points up by his ears. His eyes were also a bright green, matching his mane very well. He wore a green vest and a gray-silver band around each leg. He also had a simple watch on his left foreleg. He always had his quill and notebook with him. He sported a cresant moon and quill cutie mark on his flanks. He could easily blend into a crowd, except that he had a pair of small antlers growing from his head.

Silver began trotting over to the tree, motioning the others to follow him as he went. Silver couldn't help but chuckle silently as he thought about how weird this little group of friends must look to everypony else who saw them. Quill had antlers, and often kept to himself, but he hung out with Silver, Ocean, Pyroneus, and Earthroot because they were all a little more unique than the average pony. Silver was a ruins explorer, but that wasn't the strange thing about him. Silver was 1/4th Alicorn, and managed to get the genes for Alicorn wings. Earthroot was a botanist, but Silver and Pyroneus suspected there was something else that he did that they did not know about. Pyroneus was the most mysterious of the group. He never told them about his past, and all he would ever say was that he was not from Equestria. Quill liked to document Silver's adventures, as well as the exploits of the others in the group. Ocean, however, was the most unique out of any of them.

Everypony has a virtue, something that defines them the best, the one characteristic about them that stands out the most. The six most powerful virtues in Equestria are known as the Elements of Harmony; kindness, loyalty, honesty, laughter, generosity, and magic. Silver's virtue was protection and Quill's was observation, for example. Ocean didn't really have a virtue. She had multiple virtues. Ocean had multiple personalities living within her. Nopony knows why she has multiple personalities, but they are there, and more importantly, they each represented an Element of Harmony; Cici was honesty, Asher was laughter, Zarina May was magic, Rosina was kindness, Mela was generosity, and Rina was loyalty. However, the other personalities have gone into a dormant state, "ever since those six ponies defeated Nightmare Moon in the Everfree" Silver thought to himself.

After some talking and sharing of their recent adventures since they had seen each other last, Silver stood up and cleared his throat.

"Ahem! So, now that we are all here, shall I explain WHY we are here?" Silver looked around at his friends, all of whom had looks of excitement and curiosity on their faces. He smiled and spoke again, "The other week, while looking for a specific ruined temple that was rumored to be located at the base of one of those mountains over there," he pointed south, towards the mountains that rose out of the un-named forest, "I stumbled upon something amazing!" He spread his hooves to emphasize his last word. "I am going to show you guys." He smiled as he saw each of his friends give into their curiosity, due to all of their eyes lighting up in varying degrees.

Silver took the lead, with Ocean close to his side. Quill followed the couple, Earthroot behind him. Pyroneus took up the rear of the group. They usually took this kind of formation when Silver led them on one of his infamous adventures. They usually ended up with a cave in, flooding, or lots and lots of fire…or any combination of the tree. It was a common occurrence that curiosity would get the better of Silver, Ocean, or Earthroot.

The group traveled throughout the day, heading towards one of the mountains in the forest. Silver wouldn't tell them anything about where he was taking them other than that it was going to be awesome. Traveling through the forest had been uneventful, so had their climb up the mountain.

"Ok. Let's stop here!" Silver announced as they walked onto a nice sized ledge. It had a magnificent view of the forest below, one that kept Earthroot's attention for several minutes. The ledge was relatively flat, and had nothing but dirt and rock on it, except for a rather large bolder that sat against the mountain on the inside-most part of the ledge.

After getting the fire started and eating, Silver seemed to be more energized than normal. "Silver, dear? Are you ok?" Ocean asked Silver.

"Yes! We're here!" Silver said excitedly while looking at the bolder.


	3. Chapter 2: The Forgotten City

The bolder stood there, like an unmovable sentry, looking out over the landscape that sprawled out under the ledge. The moonlight shone over its rough, jagged exterior, making it shine slightly as bits of light bounced off of more polished bits of its rocky skin. Silver was patting the rock lightly, as if it were a prized gem that needed to be handled with extreme care.

"It's a rock…" Earthroot was laughing as he spoke. He was trying to lighten up the situation, even just a little bit.

"…It's a bolder…but that does not matter!" Silver was getting annoyed by all the joking about how he had brought all of them there just to see a rock. "What DOES matter is what is BEHIND this bolder!" Silver pointed out that there was an indent in the mountain wall behind the bolder that stood there.

Quill stepped forward and examined the wall closely. He nodded as he saw that the bolder did, in fact, block an opening in the mountain, affirming Silver's claim.

Silver looked back at the others. "SEE! Quill sees it! So…who is going to help me move it?" He looked at Pyroneus and Earthroot expectantly.

"Ok…let's move your glorious rock." Earthroot chuckled as he stepped and positioned himself to push the rock. Pyroneus just nodded and stood next to the bolder, ready to push it whenever the others were ready. Silver smiled and put his fore hooves on the bolder, ready to push.

"On the count of three…" Silver instructed the other two stallions. "One…two…THREE!"

All three stallions pushed the rock with all their strength. The bolder refused to move at first, but after a moment, the bolder shifted, rocking at first, and then eventually rolling slowly away from its original place of rest. As the bolder moved, a small amount of light began to shine out of the hole which the bolder had been guarding. Once the opening was completely uncovered, the three stallions stopped pushing the bolder and sat back, catching their breaths.

After a minute of heavy breathing, Silver spoke up, "This is what I wanted to show everypony." He motioned toward the opening that was now sucking in air, creating a low howling sound. "And no, I do not mean the opening; I mean what is at the end of this tunnel." He finished in a slightly annoyed tone while looking at Earthroot, who chuckled lightly in response.

The walk through the cave had been long and tedious, but surprisingly well lit. Two lines of magically lit gems followed the cave further into the mountain, giving off a soft white glow as they traveled deeper into the cave. Every now and then they would see one or two gems that were no longer giving off light, as if they had either been skipped, had the magic sucked out of them, or had finally used up all their magic and returned to their normal, non-lit state of being.

It was obvious to all of them that the tunnel, at least in the past, had been well traveled, considering the number of light-producing gems and the smoothness of the cave walls. The wind was still blowing past them as they walked deeper into the mountain, as if there would be no end to the amount of air the mountain needed to inhale to fill its lungs. Silver was trotting happily through the tunnel, humming a soft, yet joyful tune to himself as they went. Ocean kept examining the gems, noting the intensity of magic that filled the gems that lined the walls. Pyroneus just kept walking, silent and observant, as he always was. Crescent Quill was making mental notes of everything he saw so that he could later write it down in his notebook. Earthroot was also looking around, but seemed to tense up the further they got into the cave, as if something were bothering him.

After about fifteen minutes of traveling, the wind seemed to die down as a slightly brighter light began to grow closer to the group of friends. Silver immediately quickened his pace out of sheer excitement, while the others sped up to keep up with their leader in this adventure. As they got closer to the light source, Silver sped up into a gallop, and through Silver, the rest of the group began to gallop as well.

They all stopped as they reached the end of the tunnel. There, shining magnificently before them was a large chamber. The chamber was a large, half-sphere room with elegant patterns made of different colored magical gems flowing across the rock walls. None of the patterns made any sense, however, because portions of the designs had gone blank from the gems losing their light. In the center of the chamber hung a large orb that was constantly changing colors, as if it were alive. But the most magnificent thing they saw was what filled the chamber. Along the floor of the giant half-sphere was a city. Smaller buildings lined the outside edge, by the walls of the chamber, and steadily grew larger towards the center of the room. At the very heart of the city stood a tower, higher than the rest of the buildings, which touched the glowing, multi-colored orb.

The group stood on the ledge that over-looked the city for several minutes, most of which trying to comprehend what they were seeing. Silver just stood there, looking between his open-mouthed and amazed friends, and the underground city they were so amazed by, a large grin across his muzzle. This was exactly the reaction he had been hoping for.

Their amazement was soon replaced by horror as they reached the edge of the city. Corpses lay everywhere. Some ponies had been ripped apart, some blown apart, and some, none of them even wanted to imagine what happened to some of the poor souls who had once lived down in the underground city.

The first body they came across had its legs ripped off and one hoof shoved through its skull. The next had its head imbedded in a wall not far from what remained of the rest of its body. Some looked as if they had simply exploded; bits of bones and body parts scattered across large areas. The whole scene disturbed each of them. "WHY WOULD YOU WANT US TO SEE THIS!?" Ocean yelled at Silver after the first few bodies.

"I-I didn't come down here when I found it…I didn't know this was what we would find…" Silver was in a state of shock and disbelief when he answered, having only seen the city from the opening and then gone and sealed it so that he could explore it with his friends later.

The further they went into the city, the worse it got. Bodies chopped in half by swords, heads hacked off with knives. Not even the newborns were spared the nightmarish deaths; a baby Pegasus had its wings ripped off and seemed to have been thrown approximately 3 stories down to its demise. The deaths seemed to get worse the closer they got to the tower, which they all seemed determined to reach so they could find out what had caused all of this death and devastation.

The dead were not the only things that greeted them as they moved towards the tower. Dark black mushrooms sprouted from seemingly random places throughout the city; the middle of the road, off the side of buildings, and they filled the occasional alleyway. The fungus seemed to pop up all over the place, in various sizes, ranging from as big as a pony, to as small as a bottle cap.

"I-is it possible that the spores could have caused these ponies to go so homicidally insane?" Quill was actually the pony who spoke up, asking the question on almost all their minds.

"No, this is just your average mushroom that grows in caves, especially caves with magically enhanced gems for light." Earthroot answered, his voice filled with confidence, yet shaking from the horrors that lay on the ground around them.

The group breathed a collective sigh of relief at Earthroot's answer, knowing that he knew his plant life better than almost any pony in Equestria. With that worry gone from their minds, the group continued towards the tower in the middle of the city.

The tower had only one entrance; a set of double doors that seemed untouched by the madness of the city around them. Inside, the lobby of the tower was a dull, dark gray color. Only a single reception desk sat at the end of the narrow, hallway-like lobby. There were no chairs or benches for ponies to sit on, which allowed the group to assume that it was not a very welcoming place to begin with, before the gruesome deaths began outside. What surprised them all the most was the lack of dead bodies in the lobby; there was only a layer of dust from years of being untouched.

Other than the desk, the only other object in the room was a door to the right of the desk. Through the door was another gray colored room, except, this room was a stair-well. The stairs wound upwards in a box-like spiral, stopping at a small platform in each corner of the room. There were no other doors to go into the other floors of the building, leaving only one other direction for the group to go; up.

The accent was long and boring; the only thing that kept the group going was the thought of what waited for them at the top of the tower. As they grew closer to the end of the stairs, colors began to dance in the air, turning the dull gray of the stair well into a welcomed prismatic display.

The door at the top of the stairs was wide open; with a small, wedge-shaped rock stuffed under it to keep it open. The roof of the tower was rather bare except for the middle, where the orb sat between the tower and the stone column that connected it to the ceiling. The group gazed at it in wonder; it's changing patterns, swirls of color, how it shone brightly, like a sun for the underground city.

Silver and Pyroneus were the first to step forward, towards the orb. They both walked up to the orb.

"It seems to be emitting heat." Silver called back to Quill, who was jotting down notes and recording observations in his notebook. "I'm going to touch it now." Silver looks at Pyroneus, "You ready in case something happens?" Pyroneus nods in response. Silver reaches his hoof out towards the orb and touches it gently.

It was smooth, and felt even warmer to the touch. The heat even seemed to fluctuate with the colors as they swirled and changed. Red gave off the most heat, while purple gave off the least. Silver made note to tell Quill that once he was done inspecting the orb. Pyroneus kept a careful eye on both the orb and Silver, watching for anything to change in either of them.

Earthroot and Ocean just sat back and watched as the others examined the orb. Earthroot, after a few minutes, decided to look out over the city. The view was even more terrifying than the walk through the city had been. Bodies lay in all directions, like white ants lying motionless across the ground. Several buildings were collapsed; covering Celestia knows how many other dead bodies in rubble. There were even mushrooms as big as buildings that could be seen from the top of the tower. Earthroot shuddered and stepped back, not wanting to see anymore.

After a few more minutes, Silver took his hoof off of the orb and walked to Quill. "It is smooth and warm to the touch. The heat fluctuates with the color; red is the warmest and purple is the coolest. And there's…something else in there…I can't tell what."

Silver looked over at Ocean. Her colors from the orb danced beautifully off of his marefriend's smooth white coat. He smiled and walked over to her, and placed a hoof on her back, gently rubbing her smooth coat. "Babe? Do you think you could use your magic on that orb and see if there is something in it?"

Ocean looked back at Silver, puzzled slightly, and then nodded. "Yes, dear. I'll see if I can find anything." With that, she moved towards the orb and sat down about five feet away. She bowed her head and closed her eyes, her horn beginning to glow a royal blue.


End file.
